Three men have been charged in the US over a Cold War-style Russian spy ring that spoke in code, passed information hidden in bags and magazines, and tried to recruit people with ties to an unnamed New York City university.

The US government was not responsible for sustained electronic attacks that crippled North Korea’s internet infrastructure last month, two senior US officials have said.

A suspected al-Qaida terrorist charged over the 1998 attacks on embassies in east Africa that killed more than 200 people has died in custody days before his trial was to start in the United States.

Osama bin Laden’s son-in-law, the voice of fiery al-Qaeda propaganda videotapes after the 9/11 attacks, was yesterday convicted of conspiring to kill Americans for his role as the terror group’s spokesman.

The largest bank in the US, JPMorgan Chase, will pay $614m and improve mortgage lending procedures under a new deal.

Few things would be as surprising as the sight of JPMorgan (JPM) Chase & Co pleading guilty in a criminal case. Yet this could be a real possibility, if we are to believe recent news reports about the bank’s settlement negotiations with the Justice Department.

A New York man’s multibillion-dollar lawsuit claiming half-ownership of Facebook should be dismissed, a judge said.

The US has filed a fraud lawsuit against Bank of America, accusing it of causing taxpayers more than $1bn (€770m) of losses by selling thousands of toxic mortgages to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

Six people have been arrested in Britain as part of an FBI-led sting targeting online financial fraudsters involved in the illegal trade of stolen bank and credit card information, according to the American authorities.

The US has accused Iranian government agents of plotting to assassinate the Saudi ambassador, immediately using the thwarted plot to step up sanctions and recruit international allies in a bid to further isolate Tehran.

AGENTS of the Iranian government were last night accused of being involved in a plot to assassinate the Saudi ambassador to the United States, with help from a purported member of a Mexican drug cartel.

AN INTERNET poker company that was blocked from operating in the US last spring as part of an online gambling crackdown was “not a legitimate poker company, but a global Ponzi scheme”, federal prosecutors have claimed.

The trustee recovering money for Bernard Madoff’s cheated investors has reached a $7.2bn settlement with the estate of a Florida philanthropist who had been the single-largest beneficiary of the fraud.

FBI agents raided three hedge funds in what one of the targets called a wide-ranging probe of insider trading in the financial industry.

US authorities said the East Coast’s largest shipping port experienced a security breach as eight dock workers were charged in New York with cocaine trafficking and another was charged in a stock fraud scheme.

A JUDGE in New York has ordered 10 defendants who admitted acting as Russian spies deported from the United States in a swap that results in four spies being released by Russia.

The largest Russia-US spy swap since the Cold War appeared to be in motion today, with up to 10 guilty pleas planned in New York by defendants accused of spying for Russia in exchange for the release of convicted Russian spies.

Eleven people accused of spying for Russia were formally charged in a US indictment, more than a week after the FBI announced their arrests.

Jamaica’s top police officer appealed for calm today after an alleged drugs baron was arrested.

Three Pakistani men said to have supplied funds to Times Square car bomb suspect Faisal Shahzad were arrested in a series of raids as the FBI followed the money trail of the failed attack.

A US-trained Pakistani scientist was convicted of attempting to kill FBI agents and others while detained in Afghanistan.

A US judge declared a mistrial at the racketeering trial of John “Junior” Gotti after a New York jury failed to reach a verdict against the son of the notorious Gambino crime family mob boss – the case’s fourth hung jury in five years.

US Federal prosecutors are seeking to take over four US mosques and a New York City skyscraper owned by a Muslim organisation suspected of being controlled by the Iranian government, in one of the biggest counter-terrorism seizures in American history.

Bernard Madoff’s auditor pleaded guilty to fraud charges today, admitting failing to verify the disgraced money manager’s financial records.

One of America's wealthiest men was arrested on the day he was due to fly to London over a £15.6m (€17.11m) insider trading case.